


Revenant

by supergirrl



Series: Words [4]
Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Angharad is back to fuck shit up, F/F, F/M, Gen, Revenants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-09
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-08-07 14:27:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7718344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/supergirrl/pseuds/supergirrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Angharad lived.  She died.  And now, she walks again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Squishy_TRex](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Squishy_TRex/gifts).



> Hello everyone! This fic is dedicated to my IRL best friend, who goes by Squishy_TRex on here, who is hilarious and a great writer (so go check out her stuff!) and an awesome all-around human being. This takes place in my Words series, and while it (kind of) stands alone, I would recommend reading the other parts first. 
> 
> Trigger warnings for canonical death and mentions of previous sexual assault and self-harm.

_Out here, everything hurts._

That was one of the last things Furiosa ever said to Angharad, and she was wrong. 

 

Dying had been painless, easy. Her head cracked against the unforgiving ground, and then she was fading away, mind slipping into oblivion long before her heart beat its last.

 

It was the coming back that hurt.

 

She had been floating; everything was warm, soft, and although she regretted leaving her sisters and Furiosa behind, the peace of death hadn’t seemed so bad. In a way, she had been prepared for it, gladly risking her life for the people she loved. Angharad had always known that her death was a possibility if she rebelled against Joe; the goddess had told her so, when She came to Angharad, hundreds of days ago. 

Yet She had also said that her death would bring about a new world, and Angharad knew she could pass from this world content in that knowledge. Somehow, her sacrifice would neutralize the threat of Joe, and Furiosa would lead her sisters to a life of happiness and safety in the Green Place of Many Mothers. Her lost family would be greet her, in what Furiosa called the eternal Green Place, the paradise that the Vuvalini believe awaited the good after death, and there she would wait in peace for her lover and her sisters. 

 

And Angharad would finally be reunited with her goddess, the Mother of the World, whose presence she had craved ever since that single visitation, so long ago. She had spent hours praying, begging the One Who Was All to return to her. Nothing could compare to the grace, the safety, and the utter serenity of Her divine presence, though the love she shared with her sisters, Miss Giddy, and Furiosa came close. 

 

Ready to see her family again, to be free of the pains of the world and rejoice in communion with her goddess, she let go.

 

Something slammed through her, like the jolt that sometimes startled her from a state of near-sleep, and suddenly she was back, lying in the cabin of the Gigahorse, her belly torn open. Yet she barely registered the horror of what had been done to her, because she was suffocating, choking, crushed by the weight of her body. It reminded her of _before_ , being trapped beneath Joe’s wretched bulk, desperately telling herself that she was not a thing, over and over-

 _No._ She had died because she took the chance to be free of him, to liberate herself and her sisters from his filthy hands, and she would not suffer like this in death.

 

With all of her strength, Angharad heaved herself upwards, clawing her way out of the prison of her corpse. She was more than a mortal form, something so much greater than flesh, and she could not, would not, be trapped by it anymore. 

 

And then she was free, looking down at the ruin of her broken body. They must have cut her open to get the sprog…but where was it? For a moment, she only heard Rictus’s shouting and Giddy’s quiet words of comfort, then she made out what he was saying.

“I had a little baby brother! And he was perfect, perfect in every way!”

A brother. So the thing growing in her belly had been a healthy boy, Joe’s long-desired heir. Angharad had not wanted it, had detested every moment of her pregnancy, but she still mourned for the sprog. He deserved better than this, a violent, untimely death at the hands of the man who had violated her, and she hoped that unborn children went to the Eternal Green Place too.

Suddenly, Miss Giddy gave a horrible gasp and fell forward, collapsing onto Angharad’s corpse. She reached towards the old woman, but her hands passed through her, and Angharad realized that even though she could see and hear people who were alive, she could not touch them. She still walked among them but was set apart by some invisible barrier, separating the living and the dead. 

She watched, helpless, as the Organic Mechanic-a rotten smeg, nearly as bad as Joe himself-came forward and put his fingers against Giddy’s neck, feeling for a pulse. 

When he announced that the old woman was dead, the pain was almost a physical blow, striking Angharad low in her gut. Miss Giddy, her mentor, the woman who had kept her sane, was gone. 

Giddy didn’t remember her own age, but she was ancient even by Old World standards.  When they planned their escape, she chose to stay behind, knowing that she wouldn’t survive the outside. But Angharad wasn’t sure if the Road itself had killed her, or her grief, or perhaps some combination of both.

Another death on Joe’s hands. Another innocent life taken because of his insatiable desire to own everyone and everything. All of Giddy’s knowledge, her kindness and indomitable will, lost forever because of him.

For a moment, Angharad forgot that she could not touch him and lunged for him, her rapist and her murderer, prepared to throttle him, tear his throat out with her teeth, whatever it took. She believed firmly in no unnecessary killing, but the necessity of his death was undeniable. 

Her fingers closed around nothing, and she fell back, feeling the familiar combination of frustration and rage. Why was she still here, able to observe what went on around her but powerless to actually do anything?

 

Angharad remembered a story Miss Giddy had told, hundreds of days ago, when it had just been the two of them together in the Vault. She said that in the Old World, some believed that a person who was wronged in life sometimes came back from the dead, lingering in this world until they had justice. 

 

Revenants, she had called them. The returners, those who walk again, roaming the earth to find the justice they had been denied in life.

 

She may have been dead in this world, but Angharad would not pass on to the next one until Joe was dead and her loved ones were safe. 

 

Based on the commands she had heard the Imperators shouting, the Bullet Farmer must have gone ahead in an effort to catch up the Rig. But she needed to see what was going on around her before she could make any decisions about what to do next.

Angharad moved down from the Gigahorse, passing through its metal walls as if they were no more substantial than smoke.

For a moment she was overwhelmed by the vastness of Joe’s army, with dozens of vehicles, hundreds of War Boys, and thousands of bullets, all working to kill Furiosa and put her sisters back into chains. What were the odds that five people-six, if you counted the Fool-with a single vehicle, even one as mighty as the War Rig, could prevail against them?

None of that mattered, Angharad reminded herself. Guns and motors, no matter how numerous, were insignificant against the will of the Goddess, and She had promised that Furiosa could prevail against Joe. And even in death, Angharad could help them, increase their chances of survival.

Her feet squelched in the mud, and despite the noxious smell rising from it, Angharad smiled. The majority of the War Party’s vehicles would be trapped in it, utterly useless until they could be freed, which would take hours. This mire, as unpleasant as it was, would buy Furiosa precious time to put more distance between them and Joe, to reach the Green Place and its defendable borders.

And although Angharad could not touch Joe directly, she could hinder him and his army.  His army, whose power was largely based on its ability to move.  

Well, she could certainly take care of that.

Angharad moved quickly through the camp, her footsteps feather-light. Her leg no longer ached, she was free from the weight of the pregnant belly, and her sense of purpose filled her with energy.

She was not nearly as knowledgeable about cars as Toast, but she did know some basic things. First, cars required guzzoline to move, so if she removed their guzzoline, they would go nowhere. So Angharad unscrewed the caps that held guzzoline in tanks, letting it flow over her feet and into the mud. She only did this to a few vehicles, knowing that it was only a temporary solution. 

Another thing she knew about cars was that, if their tires lost air, they wouldn’t move, and tires were difficult to repair away from the Citadel. Furiosa told them that tires were a rare amenity left over from the Old World, something that no one remembered how to make, and so only prized vehicles-like the Rig and the Gigahorse-carried spares.  Destroying the tires would eliminate the threat posed by various, less important pursuit vehicles. Angharad had found that she could touch solid objects if she focused hard enough, and so she snagged a knife from the belt of a dozing War Boy. She set to work slicing open gashes in the stiff rubber tires, cuts to match the ones on her face.

She noticed a War Boy staring in her direction, clearly confused; he must have seen the knife moving through the air, unassisted. Angharad knew she had to make sure he didn’t raise the alarm, because even though Joe couldn’t hurt her anymore, she didn’t want him to discover her sabotages just yet. Better that he didn’t notice until dawn, when he was ready to move, so as to waste more time. But how could she silence him without harming him?

Struck by inspiration, Angharad willed herself to become visible, but not as she saw herself now, untouched by human hands. She revealed herself in the state she had died in, her limbs bent and broken, spine twisted and belly sliced open. Even in the dim light she knew that the sight was utterly horrifying, even to one as mutilated as him. Above scarred cheeks, she saw his eyes widen at the ruin of her mortal body. She raised a finger to her lips, then pointed at him to make sure he got the message.

Immediately he turned and hurried in the other direction, and she set back to her work, satisfied.    

After that, she had to rest; handling solid objects was draining, and she still couldn’t touch people. Having to take time to learn the rules of her new-well, not life, mode of existence-was incredibly frustrating, when all she wanted to do was sabotage the army as much as possible, then rejoin the Rig.   

 

Looking around to make sure no one was watching, Angharad lifted the hood of one of the pursuit vehicles and looked down at the engine, trying to remember everything Toast had ever told her about cars. She began to pull at wires randomly, hoping she could cause some permanent damage.

Toast. The thought of her sister sent a wave of longing through her, and regret. Their final interaction had been over the gun Furiosa had told her to load, during that final chase in the canyon. Angharad remembered staring down at the weapon thrust into her hands, struggling with her conflicting emotions, wanting to do what was necessary to keep them safe, but also feeling overwhelmed by revulsion for such a weapon, a tool Joe used to oppress and terrorize people. Even if she’d had time to process what she felt, she had never loaded a gun before, only knew what Furiosa and Toast told them. 

So when Toast had snatched it, Angharad had looked at her, all her confusion and guilt writ plain on her face, and she realized that Toast might have thought that she was judging her for loading the gun. Later, she told herself, she would apologize to Toast. 

And now, she would never have the chance to explain, to make things right. The thousands of days they had shared, the years of companionship and shared tears and triumphs, the love that reminded Angharad what it was to be human, ended on that final bitter note. 

There were so many unspoken words, things that she would never get to say to the people she loved most. She would never tell Cheedo how brave she was, brave and strong and wonderful, and that Angharad was so proud of her. Or ask Capable to promise to never lose her gentle heart, the kindness and compassion that even Joe’s cruelties could not stamp out. They had only discovered Dag’s pregnancy a few weeks earlier, and Angharad had been so caught up in her own pregnancy and the details of the escape that they had scarcely spoken of it. She had been meaning to remind Dag that the sprog inside her did not define her, did not mean that Joe owned her. She was a luminous being, a child of the Goddess, and her value far exceeded what she carried in her belly. These were the thoughts that had carried her through her own pregnancy; what would happen to Dag without them? And although Toast was the smartest person she knew, would she know how much Angharad loved her, despite their disagreements? 

 

And Furiosa-oh, Furiosa. Lover of her body and soul, not from a desire to spite Joe or their shared trauma, but because they were soul mates. They had had so few opportunities to be together, to talk, so Angharad tucked away things she wanted to share with Furiosa, things to be said in her lover’s arms under the open sky of the Green Place.          

 

Why hadn’t she told them when she had the chance? She had been waiting for-what? A quiet time, a safe place? But she had hesitated, and now, her words died with her.

_I love you,_ she thought fiercely, willing her thoughts to fly across the Wasteland and into their hearts, _I love you and I died for you and I would die a thousand times over for you._

 

Tears burned in her eyes, but her cheeks remained dry. Revenants did not cry. 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I lied, this is going to be three chapters, not two! Enjoy!

Some time later, satisfied in the knowledge that the majority of Joe’s army would not be going anywhere, Angharad turned her thoughts towards the Rig.  It had once seemed so massive and forbidding to her, a symbol of war and the man she hated, and yet now to her eyes it was a small, fragile thing, a vessel containing everyone she loved. 

 

Angharad blocked out the tumult of War Boys trying to free their vehicles and focused all her energy on the Rig and the people it carried, visualizing it in her mind.

 

And when she opened her eyes, she was there. She looked around, trying to figure out what was happening.

The Rig was beside her, half-trapped in the mud, with a chain wrapped around a tree. There was the Fool, clinging to the tree, as if somehow he could hold it in the ground.  Furiosa, trying to push the Rig free of the mud, and Toast, Dag, and Cheedo running towards a hill. Despite the chaos, they all looked alright, to her great relief. 

But where was Capable?

She whirled around, frantic, before locating her sister in the cab of the War Rig, seated beside…the War Boy? She was certain that they had gotten rid of him before the canyon, yet there he was, driving, with Capable’s hand on his shoulder. He must be on their side, then, but how was that possible? The last time she’d seen him, he’d been screaming Joe’s foul words in her face.  

The sound of gunshots brought her back to herself, and with a lurch of horror she realized that the gunfire was entirely random; the shooter didn’t seem to care what he hit, even if it meant damaging one of Joe’s precious ‘assets.’

In the long weeks before their escape, she had convinced her sisters to train with her, to strengthen their bodies in preparation for life outside the Vault. Joe wanted them soft and weak, so they had to be careful, but sneaking around behind his back was something they had abundant practice in. They took turns running up and down the steps, and Miss Giddy told them about floor exercises she had heard of people doing, in the Old World.  When Angharad’s belly began to inhibit her participation in these activities, Toast took the lead, urging them on, reminding them that they would need all their wits and strength to survive in the world outside. 

Angharad was profoundly grateful for that training as her sisters crested the hill to safety, outrunning the gunfire with a speed developed by their long hours of exertion.  It was sheer luck that none of them had been struck. 

 

Even as that thought passed through her mind, she realized that Furiosa was still behind her, still in range of the bullets spraying around them. 

Without hesitation, Angharad ran back, placing herself firmly between Furiosa and danger, just as she had a few hours earlier when she prevented Joe from shooting her in the canyon. She had known that Joe wouldn’t shoot her, wouldn’t take the risk of harming the heir, but she had been ready to die for Furiosa. Although she could no longer die for Furiosa, she would give whatever she had to keep her safe. 

As Furiosa moved up the hill, she followed her love, closer than a shadow and fiercer too. 

 

Just when Angharad thought they were safe, she felt a violent thud, like someone was striking her with an iron fist, then a familiar blossoming of burning pain. She’d been shot. Again.

 _Well, at least it was me and not Furiosa_ , she thought numbly as she probed at her side.  The bullet had passed through her, but even as her fingers found the exit hole, it was closing, the flesh mending itself almost instantly. There was no blood, either.

 

Although it was a significant improvement over her previous gunshot wound, Angharad still began to feel dizzy and weak, drained like she had earlier after sabotaging the engines. She was still present in this world, but no longer really a part of it, and interacting with it was draining. Feeling herself fading, Angharad climbed into the back of the Rig, laying down on the floor just as darkness overcame her.

 

 

When she opened her eyes again, it wasn’t like waking up or regaining consciousness. It was as if she had been somewhere else, flipped a switch, and was there, entirely aware of her surroundings. Sunlight poured into the Rig as she looked at its other occupants.  Furiosa was driving, of course, with the Fool sitting beside her in the front seat. Her sisters were curled up together in the back, dozing, joined by the War Boy from the previous night.

 

Angharad sat up, positioning herself between the two front seats, so close to Furiosa that she could smell the motor oil on her skin. She saw the tension in Furiosa’s jaw, the grief etched into every line of her face, and she longed to reach out and comfort her. 

It felt so strange, sitting there, only inches from her lover and her sisters, yet unable to interact with them in any way. She felt as if she should be able to take up her place between Capable and Dag, like nothing had changed.

But they had. She was dead, and there was no going back. 

That train of thought lead nowhere good, and Angharad pushed it aside, trying to concentrate on something more productive. From her vantage point, she could watch both of the men, while also watching the horizon for any threats. 

After quickly scanning their surroundings for danger, she turned her attention back to the two men that had unexpectedly joined their escape.

First she turned a critical eye onto the unexpected addition to their party, the War Boy. He had taken the seat closest to the open side of the Rig, preventing her sisters from falling out and shielding them from any potential harm, a decision of which she approved. Somehow he seemed much younger than he had yesterday, when they’d hauled him off Furiosa and flung him from the Rig. Then he’d been a anonymous yet grotesque instrument of Joe’s oppression, ready to give his life to return them to chains. But now he was just a man-a boy, really, no older than herself-who seemed to have trouble breathing and shivered despite the warmth of the sun.

Capable was curled up against him in sleep, his arm draped loosely over her shoulders.  He was watching her, though there was no possessiveness in it, no greed. The way he looked at Capable…it was almost as if he couldn’t believe she was real. Angharad noticed that he had one of Capable’s scarves tied around his wrist, and wondered again what had transpired between her sister and this strange creature.

Yet Angharad didn’t trust him. The War Boy may have been kamakrazee when he attacked them, but it didn’t excuse what he had done. She was fairly certain that he would not harm her sisters, not physically, but she feared that he would hurt Capable in other ways. 

The way his gaze lingered on Capable, as if he was afraid she would disappear if he looked away, reminded her of the small buzzing insects that would occasionally find their way into the Vault and spend the remainder of their short lives flinging themselves against a flickering light, desperately seeking something they could never touch. 

She hoped that Capable was careful. He was going to flame out, die hot and fast, and she didn’t want her sister caught up in his blaze of death and glory, or left heartbroken in its wake. Despite all this, she thought that Nux was more useful than potentially harmful to them.

But the Fool…he was dangerous. He had helped them in the canyon and the bog, but it didn’t undo his actions before. Perhaps he hadn’t meant to shoot her, but he had pointed a gun to her head, and Toast’s and Dag’s too. She would need to keep an eye on him.

 

As though he could hear her thoughts, the Fool’s gaze moved over her. At first, she assumed it was a coincidence, but then he met her eyes, and she realized with a start that he could _see_ her, was looking right at her. And yet…there was no fear in his face.  Sadness, perhaps, and remorse, but no fear. And unlike the previous night, she had not willed herself to be visible to living eyes.

_I’m dead, you fool! I’m dead and I’m still here, why aren’t you scared?_

Then she thought that perhaps she was not the first revenant he had seen. There was something haunted about this feral man, the way he constantly looked over his shoulder and flinched away from things that no one else could see. What was he fleeing?

He lowered his eyes and mumbled, so quietly that even Furiosa didn’t seem to hear him, “’m sorry.”

This was his apology, then, for her fall. Although she didn’t particularly like this man, or trust him at all, she found she couldn’t blame him for her death. He should not have shot her, it was true, but ultimately that was not why she had died. Angharad was dead because she had dared to fight Joe for her freedom, and freedom for the people she loved, and she would never regret that decision. The blame for her death rested entirely at Joe’s feet, and she intended to make him pay for it.

 

 

The day passed quietly and uneventfully. The only surprise was when Furiosa stopped the Rig and switched places with the Fool, allowing him to drive. Angharad wondered what he had done to earn Furiosa’s trust enough that she would share such an important task with him. But that question, intriguing as it was, took second place to the thought that had been nagging at her for hours. 

What was taking so long? From Furiosa’s descriptions, the Green Place was no more than a day’s ride from the mountains, they should have reached it by now. They hadn’t encountered enemies, but neither had they seen any signs of the Many Mothers, or any life at all, for that matter. Doubt began to gnaw at Angharad; was it possible that they were lost? Or…or that there was nothing out here, no Green Place to reach.

No, it wasn’t possible. Furiosa must have misremembered the distance between the Citadel and the Green Place. An easy mistake, considering that she’d only made the journey once thousands of days ago, as a young and frightened child. 

 

Then, when Toast pointed out a flickering watchtower in the distance, and Furiosa said that she remembered something like that, excitement began to flicker in Angharad’s chest. She sat with her sisters and watched, just as confused and hopeful as they were, as Furiosa climbed down from the Rig and called out those precious words, the secret ones that Angharad had only heard once, what had sustained Furiosa during her seven thousand days in the Citadel.

The woman standing atop the watchtower let out a cry, and bikes came down from the dunes. When Angharad realized that they were all driven by women, and saw Furiosa embrace the other woman like a long-lost sister, giddiness surged up inside her. These were the Many Mothers. Her dream, her ultimate goal, had been realized.

 

She followed her sisters from the Rig, barely able to comprehend her joy as they began to mingle with the Vuvalini. They were safe. Furiosa was reunited with her people, and soon, they would be in the Green Place. And Angharad, knowing that her mission was complete, would pass on.

Then Furiosa, smiling in a way Angharad had never seen before, said, “I can't wait for them to see it.”

One of the older women replied, seemingly bewildered, “See? See what?”

“Home. The Green Place.” Furiosa was still smiling, but Angharad was beginning to feel something, a sinking sensation in her gut. 

_But if you came from the West..._

_...you passed it._

_The crows. The creepy place with all the crows._

_The soil-_

_\- We had to get out-_

_-We had no water-_

_\- The water was filth-_

_It was poisoned._

_It was sour._

_And then the crows came._

_We couldn't grow anything._

The horrible, painful words were spoken in calm tones from sensible women, women who clearly told no lies. Yet what they said could not be true, it just couldn’t be.

Then Toast asked, “Where are the others?”

_What others?_

_The Many Mothers._

_We're the only ones left._

 

It was like she was falling from the Rig again, except this time, there were no hands reaching for her, no promise of a peaceful afterlife to cushion her fall. She was utterly alone. 

 

The Green Place, vanished. The Many Mothers, dwindled to this handful of women.  Everything they had fought for, the dream that Angharad had died for, was gone. Unattainable.  

Dimly she registered Furiosa wandering away from the group, and a part of her wanted to follow, to watch over her and her sisters in their grief, but in that moment she was a creature of rage, something entirely too dangerous and savage to be near her loved ones.

 

She flew across the sands, carried by her fury and a broken heart. Angharad didn’t know where she was going, only that a deadly and savage anger led her through the Wasteland.

 

Then on the horizon she saw them: a small group of pursuit vehicles from the Citadel.  Nowhere near the entirety of Joe’s army, they were likely just the first vehicles to be freed from the mud. Joe must have sent them ahead, with orders to intercept the Rig and the women it carried. With no idea of where they were going-Joe’s maps ended with the mountains-and limited supplies, they were essentially on a suicide mission, cast out into the desert to die because of Joe’s temper. 

Under other circumstances, Angharad might have felt sorry for them, but now all she felt was her seemingly bottomless pain and anger and loss. She had lost so much, her freedom and her sprog and even her life, but this final blow had taken her hope.  

 

She alighted near them, watching them. The vehicles were all parked, with black thumbs scurrying around making repairs. They were victims of Joe too, in their own way.

But none of them-not a single one-had suffered the way she had.

 

Angharad fell to her knees, and for the first time since her fall, she screamed, howling with the wordless ire of someone who has been robbed of everything.

 

Before, she had always turned her frustration and agony inside, never letting it harm anyone else, but now, she unleashed it on the world.

 

The storm she had swallowed, the magic dwelling inside her and occupying the spaces between her bones, poured out of her. Lightning and wind ripped free of her flesh, descending on the unsuspecting War Boys, sweeping them away. Her pain rolled in waves across the dead world, and she hoped it reached Joe and the rest of his army, wiping all of them from the face of the earth, and took her away too.

She longed to disintegrate under the force of the storm born by her grief, to disappear into nothingness, to leave a world that had caused her so much pain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the 'the Sisters worked out in the Vault' and 'Angharad died because she fought a bad man for her freedom' head canons from tumblr, I don't remember the exact posts, but I give all the credit for those ideas to their creators! Thank you for reading!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone! I'm sorry for the long delay, and for the fact that this fic is getting ANOTHER chapter. I can't believe it was originally going to be a oneshot. Also, I just wanted to say THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart to everyone that reads this fic, especially those of you who leaves kudos/comments (bluebeholder, Jaetion, and Squishy_Trex)! These last few weeks have been hard for me, and writing has helped a lot. Knowing that people are reading and enjoy this fic makes me so happy <3

But when the storm passed and she opened her eyes, she was still there, and the world was too. 

Angharad rose to her feet, feeling dizzy and weak. It wasn’t just the toll of using such powerful magic; her heart ached, and she was still reeling from the loss of the Green Place.

Night had fallen, and as she surveyed her surroundings, she realized there was no trace of the small pursuit party she had turned the full force of her rage onto, no sign that they had ever walked the earth. The vehicles, their bodies, all of it was blown away or buried deep beneath the sands.

Despite all her pain, Angharad still felt a stab of guilt. No unnecessary killing; that was what she had snarled at Furiosa when she hauled her off the War Boy back in the Rig.  She had kept Furiosa from killing that man, yet she had had no compunction about unleashing her own anger on these unlucky souls.

There was little difference between them and the War Boy she had convinced Furiosa to spare, the one who now fought for them, aside from the opportunity to desert. They were all kamakrazee, with only a handful of days left among them. But could these men have changed sides, if given the chance? She wanted desperately to believe that Joe had not entirely managed to erase their humanity.

But now, she would never know. She had killed them, and for what? The Green Place was still gone, and her grief hadn’t abated in the slightest.

Was this how it began? The senseless killing, the utter disregard for the value of life? It had been so simple; bringing about their destruction had been easier than dying herself.  She couldn’t dwell on that, she told herself. No good would come of it. 

Although Angharad wanted desperately to reach out the Mother, beg forgiveness for her vile act and seek the comfort of Her words, now was not the time. 

Her sisters and Furiosa were still out there, still needed her. Angharad tipped her head back, picturing them, casting her thoughts out into the vastness of the Wasteland.

_Capable, Toast, Cheedo, Dag, sisters of my heart, where are you? My beloved, my Furiosa, where are you?_

 

When she opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was Capable, illuminated by a flickering lantern, curled up with her War Boy atop the Rig. Angharad gave him a long, suspicious look, but she could see the happiness and calm on Capable’s face, and let them be.

The others were scattered across the dunes; Toast and Cheedo sitting together on a blanket in the sand, gazing up at the stars, surrounded by Vuvalini whose names Angharad did not know. Dag was perched on one of the bikes, her head was bent in conversation with one of the older women. Her sisters looked alright; somewhat sad, perhaps, but overall like they were handling the loss of the Green Place well. But what of Furiosa?

A flicker of movement caught her eye, and she realized Furiosa was near the Rig with the Fool, clearly discussing something. But as much as she wanted to be near Furiosa, she hesitated to join them. It would be too strange to stand there, unseen by her love but with the feral man’s strange eyes upon her. No, better to remain here with her sisters. 

She settled down on the blanket between Toast and Cheedo, listening to their quiet discussion of the stars and satellites. Whenever she looked at Furiosa, she was standing at the edge of the dunes, looking out into the great empty space before them. Occasionally her gaze would move over Angharad’s sisters or the Vuvalini, and even the Fool, who had clambered into the Rig, presumably to sleep. What was she thinking? Angharad had always considered herself skilled at reading Furiosa’s expressions, but at the moment, her face was inscrutable.

She wondered what they would do next, where they would go. From what she gathered from listening to the scraps of conversation around her, the surviving Vuvalini eked out a living by ambushing wanderers and stealing their supplies, continually on the move. But how long could they outrun Joe? Angharad knew her efforts had hindered his army for a time, but eventually he would cross the bog and sooner or later, he would run them down.  

 

Despair filled her. Would there be no escaping him? After all they had suffered for freedom, would it all be for nothing?

No, if they were recaptured, it would be worse than if they had never tried to escape.  Furiosa would be killed, without a doubt, along with the Vuvalini, the Fool, and the errant War Boy. Dag might be spared, for the sprog she carried-now Joe’s sole surviving hope for a worthy heir-but her other sisters would not. If Joe killed them, it would not be because of their failed flight attempt, but for the belts they had left in the sand. The possibility that they might carry another man’s child-even though the Fool was a feral, he was still whole-life, and sometimes half-lives like Capable’s War Boy could plant sprogs-would be a death sentence. And she would be forced to watch, helpless, as he punished those she held most dear. 

She didn’t need to breathe anymore, yet she felt her chest rising and falling rapidly, a clammy sensation overcoming her. The thought of him harming her sisters or Furiosa hurt more than the gunshot or her fall. Her skin was crawling, her heart racing, because nothing had changed, they would never be free-

Angharad forced herself to stop. What had Capable always had her do, when things became too much in the Vault? Count to ten, embrace each of her sisters, and then rest. She counted to ten, first in the common tongue they all spoke and then in some of the dead languages Miss Giddy had taught them, from the Old World. By the time she finished, she felt calm enough to rejoin her sisters. 

 

Toast and Cheedo were sleeping under a heavy quilt, which had slipped down, exposing Toast’s back. Angharad pulled it up, covering her sister, then settled down beside her.  While she didn’t know if her current form would be able to shield Toast from the wind, she needed to feel her warmth and try to protect her sister, in any way she could. 

Soon Dag joined them, lying down on Cheedo’s other side, though Capable remained in her nest with the War Boy. Out of respect for her privacy, Angharad resisted the temptation to look more closely and see what they were doing. 

 

Although Angharad couldn’t sleep, something about lying near her sisters was restful, restorative. It helped center her, bring her back to herself after her terrible fury from earlier. She had to trust that Furiosa would have a plan, and that the Goddess would provide.

But would She? Even though the One Who Is All had promised to always love Angharad, she wondered if She could love a murderer. 

She opened her heart, pleading with the Lady of Ten Thousand Names to speak to her, to offer her reassurance when she felt her hope slipping away. 

 

Yet no words came. 

 

 

Angharad passed the night listening to the steady breathing of her sisters and following the movement of the stars overhead. She hadn’t seen the night sky like this in thousands of days, since before her capture, and the sight of it almost made everything that had happened since their escape worth it. 

Slowly the camp came to life around her as the Vuvalini began to prepare food and pack up for the day’s journey. Her sisters stirred, and she felt oddly detached as she watched them yawning and stretching, all those innately human behaviors that seemed so strange to her. These small acts of living-like sharing a bite of food or braiding each other’s hair-were things she had done only two days earlier, yet they were now utterly foreign.  Angharad couldn’t comprehend why everything seemed so odd until she realized that she was changing into-what? Someone or something entirely new, unable to participate in actions that had once been fundamental to her life. 

The revelation hurt her, but it was a good reminder of her purpose. She was no longer human, nor was she alive; she was a revenant, and the only reason she still lingered in this plane of existence was to keep them safe. The conflicted feelings about her own actions, her desperate need for divine assurance-these were all secondary, distractions from her true purpose.

With that in mind, when she heard that all of them, except for the Fool, would be abandoning the Rig and driving the bikes out into the unknown expanses of salt ahead of them, she pushed down her doubts and climbed onto the back of Furiosa’s bike. 

 

As the bike rumbled beneath her, Angharad puzzled over why Furiosa would take them this way. What was she hoping to find out there? Was there even anything to find, or did the salt just go on forever? It couldn’t, but something about it-the sharp odor, the sting of the gritty wind-felt hostile to her. She wasn’t entirely sure what she was anymore, but she was certain that this dead place was not where any of them belonged.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone, I'm sorry for the long delay with this chapter. I don't have much to say, except thank you all for reading and putting up with my slow updates, and that I hope you enjoy the chapter! If you haven't read Cheedo's chapter of Our Words, I would strongly recommend you do so, because the events of this chapter may not make sense without that reference. Also, here is a link to the Words playlist, which includes music for this fic!
> 
> http://le-temps-viendra36.tumblr.com/post/152182708824/words-playlist

Every time she came back to the living world, it hurt, and this was no exception. 

Wrenched from somewhere warm and dark that felt safe, safe like her sisters’ arms and Furiosa’s embrace, she opened her eyes to utter chaos.

Through the smoky haze filling the War Rig, she could see Furiosa at the wheel, and her sisters clinging to one another. But there was no sign of either men, or any of the Vuvalini, save for one sitting beside Furiosa, and Angharad wondered if they had all been lost in the battle raging around them. The roar of engines and pounding music of the Doof Warrior filled her ears; how had the War Party gotten through the swamp?

She stuck her head out the open side of the cab for a moment-not the side she had fallen from, when had they lost the other door?-and saw, to her shock, the mountains up ahead.  Were they going back?

 

Angharad only had a moment to acknowledge the brilliance of the plan-the undefended Citadel would be easy to take, and Joe would not survive long among the Wretched-when she heard the all-too-familiar sound of Toast screaming. 

 

Icy fear pierced her heart as she saw a Pole Cat ripping Toast out of Cheedo’s arms, dragging her back to Joe. She desperately tried to catch hold of her, but Toast slipped through her fingers, and Angharad let out a wordless howl of fury.                                   

 

Without thinking Angharad flung herself from the Rig, reaching for Toast, who continued to struggle against her captors even as they swung her through the air into the back of the Gigahorse. She caught its side and scrambled aboard the vehicle where she had died. 

Through her panic, Angharad recognized what a good strategy this was-snatch her sisters one at a time from the Rig, bringing them to the Gigahorse where Joe could use them as human shields. He knew that Furiosa would not risk harming them-because if she truly only cared about spiting him, she could easily have shot them and left their bodies for him to find-and once he had them all, it would be that much easier for him to destroy the Rig and kill Furiosa. Joe was evil, but Angharad knew that he was not stupid.

But she couldn’t think about that now-all she could do was try to protect Toast. Joe wouldn’t kill her, not yet, but he could still harm her, and Angharad would not-could not-allow that to happen. 

Before, in the Vault, she had worked constantly to keep him away from her sisters, offering herself up in their places and distracting him in any way possible. But often it wasn’t enough, and he would drag one of them off to be beaten and raped while she watched helplessly. In life she had been so limited in her ability to shield them, but now-

There was nothing she would not do to protect her sisters. 

 

The Prime Imperator and Rictus were still attempting to subdue Toast, who was resisting them with all her might, but Joe’s attention was fixed entirely on the Rig and its defenders. 

Angharad looked around frantically, searching for a weapon, anything she could use against him. She was not as strong as she had been, before she unleashed the storm, but she would use whatever little strength she had left to keep Toast safe. 

Discarded off to the side of the cab was a pile of flimsy white fabric-remnants of her dress, pulled off her corpse before it had been left in the desert for the crows. She grabbed a scrap of it and lunged towards Joe, looping the fabric around his neck and pulling back, _hard_.

Her skin crawled at his proximity, but by the Goddess, it felt good to hear him choke, unable to utter even a sound of shock. She had sworn to never harm anyone else after her outburst, but Joe was the exception.  

Out of the corner of her eye, Angharad saw something flicker into being, a nebulous grey something that she had never seen before, yet kindled an instinctual, somehow familiar sense of revulsion.

Joe’s meaty hands pawed at the cloth twisting around his throat, and his jerking legs knocked the wheel, causing the Gigahorse to swerve abruptly. Rictus let go of Toast and grabbed the wheel, while the Prime Imperator tried fruitlessly to free Joe from the unseen force strangling him. Angharad ignored the clumsy attempts to dislodge her, channeling all her rage and fear, every atrocity Joe had inflicted on her or her sisters, into choking the life from him-

 

A stab of pain tore through her right side, so intense that she lost her grip on the cloth and slumped backwards onto the floor. It hurt more than anything done to her mortal body-it was a wound in her soul.  

She tried to push herself up on her elbows, but she was too weak, and the ceiling of the Gigahorse seemed to spin above her. Even though she couldn’t bleed, couldn’t die, she felt the last vestiges of her strength falling away. 

The thing she had sensed earlier-that nebulous evil-was above her, and although before it had seemed formless she somehow saw hints of Joe’s face in it.

And when it spoke, it seemed to have his foul, rattling voice, “She’s dying, you know, your Furiosa, and your goddess. I’ll have your sisters too, and I will reign eternal.”  

Furiosa dying-no, it had to be a lie, but what else could explain her excruciating pain? She couldn’t breathe, it was crushing her, and it would just be so easy to let go-

A familiar voice whispered in her ear, merciful and loving and ferocious all at once, “I am with you now, as I have always been. My beloved child, you have walked through the darkness and come forth by day to destroy him, the evil that killed the world; do not give in now." 

Her goddess had not abandoned her, did not despise her for her actions in the dunes! Galvanized by Her words, Angharad snarled, “Immortality was not meant for you, false god.”

As she spoke, she felt fresh resolve course surge through her, and she swatted the creature-the evil that had taken form in Joe-off her. She could sense its-his-fear, and reveled in it. Joe would never hurt anyone again.

It attempted to scramble away, but reinvigorated, she caught hold of it, pinning it to the floor. She felt it shrink beneath the heat of her gaze and smiled, continuing, “There’s a new world coming, an age of green and peace, and it doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to them-the people you exploited, the ones you tried to own.”

The evil thing made a final effort to shake her off, but she was unmovable. “And in their world, no one will remember you. My goddess and I will dance on your bones until they crumble into dust, and we will live forever.” 

With her final words, it disappeared, broken, leaving Joe behind to fend for himself. 

 

Angharad looked up, and saw Toast sitting in the seat beside Joe, his gun pointed in her face- _never again,_ she vowed, _never again will anyone put a gun to her head_.

She dragged herself forward on trembling arms, intending to put herself between Toast and Joe. Her hold on this world was tenuous, but she would block any bullets she could. 

And then she saw, through the window, Furiosa, clearly weak but alive, crawling towards Joe. He saw her too, and rolled down the window, reaching out with his gun-

Suddenly Toast lunged for Joe’s arm, hauling him back, and he cracked her across the face with the gun. The sight of her sister’s blood spraying through the air gave Angharad a final surge of strength, and she grabbed Joe, holding him in place as Furiosa caught his breathing mask with her metal arm.  

When Furiosa tore Joe’s face from his body, the resulting crack reverberated through Angharad, like the breaking of the world. She felt, rather than saw, the evil that dwelt within him shatter, struck down by their courage and her sacrifice. 

But despite their triumph, she was barely there, and she knew she could not leave yet. 

 

The Fool was holding Furiosa, and even with her increasingly warped connection with their world, she could hear the ominous rattle as Furiosa breathed, could see the gaping wound in her side. The evil had not lied; she was dying. And Angharad knew that she could not save Furiosa; she was too far gone, barely a part of Furiosa’s world any more. 

But the Goddess had many hands, even in the most unlikely places, like a madman who had staggered out of the desert...

“Fool!” Angharad cried, and he looked at her, startled, “Save her! You’re the only one who can!”

He was the only one who could do what she could not: save Furiosa.

 

 

She managed to cling to the world of the living for the rest of their ride back to the Citadel, determined to remain until she knew they were safe. When she heard the roars of acclaim from the Wretched, Angharad was certain that their conquest was complete. The few surviving War Boys would not pose a threat to her beloveds.   

As the platform lifted into the air, Angharad felt herself fading, and she knew she would not be returning, that she was a revenant no longer. She looked to her sisters and Furiosa one last time, wanting a final glimpse of their faces.

The five of them stood together, their faces grieving and splattered with blood, and she felt a pang of anxiety at leaving them alone in this hard, violent place.

But Joe’s cruel world was as dead as he was, and it was up to them now to build a just one in its place. Angharad knew they would rise to the task. And they would never be alone, not as long as they had one another. 

With that thought, she relinquished them into the Goddess’s care with a smile. Angharad turned her face to the sun, then let go.

_Holy Mother, is that You? I did not know you would be so beautiful._

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who reads this fic, especially those of you who leave kudos/comments <3 I appreciate you all so much, it means the world to me that people enjoy my writing. Finishing this story has made me think that, even in this post-election, Trump-dominated world, there's still hope.

**Author's Note:**

> For those of you who have watched the deleted scenes, you may notice that I changed the way Miss Giddy died. This was done for both storytelling purposes and also because I hate that deleted scene and she deserved better. 
> 
> Originally this was intended to be a oneshot, but it was getting way too long, so I split it into two parts. Part two will hopefully be up sometime in the next week! I hope you all enjoyed it, and thanks for reading!


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